Underdog Seeks Jump From Second to Spoiler

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Ride On Curlin, training at Belmont Park, has two career wins, but was second in the Preakness.CreditCreditAl Bello/Getty Images

By Tom Pedulla

June 1, 2014

The horse does not look the part of one of the top 3-year-olds in the country. The trainer oversees only four horses, and his fortunes took such a horrible turn two winters ago that he had none to work with. The owner has a passion for racing but lacks a budget to match.

And yet Ride On Curlin, the Preakness runner-up trained by Billy Gowan and owned by Daniel Dougherty, has an opportunity to be an improbable spoiler when California Chrome aims to become the 12th Triple Crown champion and the first since Affirmed in 1978 in the Belmont Stakes on Saturday.

Ride On Curlin may not be quite as crooked as a question mark, but nothing about his conformation suggests that he should be able to close as much ground as he did in the Preakness. His feet point in and his knees are not anatomically straight. Those flaws led countless potential bidders to pass on him as a yearling in 2012 despite his intriguing pedigree as a son of Curlin, the horse of the year in 2007 and 2008.

Gowan, who turns 49 on Monday, learned invaluable lessons beside Hall of Fame trainers when he assisted Jack Van Berg for five years and Bill Mott for another year. But after he received his trainer’s license in 1994, a lack of financial backing forced him to apply those lessons to horses of limited ability. Starspangled Gator, winner of the Concern Handicap at Louisiana Downs in 2007, remains the only stakes winner he has developed.

Dougherty resisted the urging of friends to leave Gowan and hire a trainer with a higher profile and stronger résumé. As admirable as his loyalty is, he does not have the wherewithal to provide much financial backing. He was willing to risk $25,000 on Ride On Curlin when he was an odd-looking yearling — but not much more.

Gowan readily admits that he all but stumbled upon Ride On Curlin during an auction at Keeneland in Lexington, Ky. He observed the flaws — no one could miss them — but as the son of a veterinarian, he also saw beyond what was anatomically incorrect.

“I liked the way he looked,” Gowan said. “I liked the way he walked. He had the body of an athlete. He looked like a runner, and usually when they look that way, they are.”

In keeping with a hands-on approach that often leads him to clean his own stalls, Gowan, along with his wife, Tracy, raised Ride On Curlin on their 35-acre farm in Shepherdsville, Ky. They would gaze at him in the paddock, wondering if he was the high-caliber horse they had waited almost two decades for.

“He would rip and run in the paddock, and Billy said, ‘I know he’s going to be a good horse,’ ” Tracy recalled. “He had some gas to him.”

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In 2008, Da’Tara, ridden by Alan Garcia, pulled off a huge upset at the Belmont Stakes, preventing Big Brown and jockey Kent Desormeaux from winning the Triple Crown.CreditCreditLucas Jackson/Reuters

He did not take long to prove that as a 2-year-old. In his second career start, he set a track record of 1 minute 3 seconds for five and a half furlongs at Ellis Park in western Kentucky in a seven-and-three-quarter-length romp with Calvin Borel aboard. He has cracked the top three in 9 of 11 career starts, winning two, finishing as a runner-up three times and taking third on four occasions for earnings of $714,687.

Gowan said he did not feel anxious as the one-and-a-half-mile Belmont Stakes approaches. He is, however, grateful.

“There are plenty of capable horsemen out there, but they don’t ever get a chance,” he said. “I’ve been waiting for one since I started.”

Even at his worst moment, when the purchase of one horse and a serious injury to another left him with an empty barn at the Fair Grounds in New Orleans in the winter of 2012, he took everything in stride. He returned home to help Tracy, who was then completing her studies to become a nurse practitioner, with their daughters, Janet Kay, who is now 13, and Alicia, who is 12.

“Billy is the same every day, which is a huge perk,” Tracy said. “He is easy to be around. He has a good outlook on life.”

Although Ride On Curlin’s only other victory was in an allowance race at Oaklawn Park in Hot Springs, Ark., in January in his 3-year-old debut, he proved his quality in the opening two legs of the Triple Crown despite poor racing luck. He drew the No. 18 post in a field of 19 for the Kentucky Derby. Borel, known for his eagerness to get to the rail in order to save ground, ignored Gowan’s instructions to use some of the horse’s speed to gain a better position entering the first turn, all but making a left turn to the rail and assuming a position behind the pack.

A sluggish pace caused the field to bunch up, forcing Borel to go nine wide to find running room. Ride On Curlin finished seventh after a wild ride that Gowan called “ridiculous.”

Ride On Curlin drew farthest outside in a field of 10 for the Preakness, and a new rider, Joel Rosario, was forced to settle him twice before a sharp rally left them one and a half lengths short of overtaking California Chrome.

On Saturday, Ride On Curlin will be ridden by John Velazquez, a two-time Belmont Stakes winner, after Rosario opted to ride Tonalist for the Belmont. It is Ride On Curlin’s chance to earn a victory and play the spoiler.

“I think he’s got a Grade I win in him,” Gowan said. “I’m just hoping it will be Saturday.”

A version of this article appears in print on , on Page D8 of the New York edition with the headline: Underdog Seeks Jump From Second to Spoiler. Order Reprints | Today’s Paper | Subscribe